NOTE: The first page of text has been automatically extracted and included below in lieu of an abstract

Abstract
Planning a course involves many issues including choosing the objectives, scope and content,
preparing a syllabus, developing lectures, laboratories, projects and assignments, and evaluation
of students. Teaching the course is the implementation of the plan while developing a rapport
with the students and monitoring classroom dynamics. Teaching requires adapting your plan to
your current group of students and to the changing educational environment. This paper will
discuss many aspects of planning and teaching an undergraduate course including a discussion
on creating a student-centered environment through active and cooperative learning, and the use
of rubrics and concept inventories. The emphasis will be on making incremental modifications to
courses and assessing the impact of the changes.

Introduction
So you have been given the task of teaching a course…. Whether you are designing a new
course, or teaching an existing course, there are many strategies to consider. You will find that
prior to meeting your students, you will have many decisions to make and things to do. However,
if your goal is to create a learning environment in which your students are expected to be active
participants, you need to include some flexibility in your planning. The profile of your students
may be different from your expectations or previous experiences; your plan will need to be
adapted. Research on engineering education is continually changing; you may want to take
advantage of some of the new work. This paper is divided into three sections: the first one will
cover some of the details of planning a course, the second section will discuss teaching the
course, and the third will suggest some next steps.

Planning a Course
Prior to making any decisions about your course, you will need to know your students’
backgrounds. What are the prerequisites for the course? This can include college-level
prerequisites and pre-college courses required of all students in the program. Does your program
usually have only high-achievers or a mixture of abilities? These questions will determine the
content and the level to which you teach. The first step in planning a course is to determine the
objectives and content.

1. Course Objectives and Content: The decision on course objectives and content generally
depends on where this course lies in the curriculum. Courses that are prerequisites for higher-
level courses may have an existing syllabus, which details the objectives and content. It is
important to determine how much latitude will be available in changing the course content.
Significant modifications to such courses may require consultation with other faculty who
rely on certain topics being covered in that course. However, if you are to teach a new course
or an elective you may be able to determine up to 100% of the course content.